Get outdoors and help clean up our watershed!

The Tuolumne River Trust is hosting a river cleanup on Saturday, September 23rd along the North Fork Tuolumne River as part of the Great Sierra River Cleanup (GSRC).

GSRC is a Sierra-wide watershed cleanup event coordinated by Sierra Nevada Alliance in collaboration with California’s Coastal Cleanup Day. Last year, 249 volunteers removed 5,711 pieces of trash from 98 miles of Sierra Nevada waterways. We’re looking to expand our efforts to make an even greater impact. You can be part of the solution and volunteer to help remove litter and plastic pollution from our beloved Sierra Nevada watershed.

The Sierra produces a significant portion of California’s water supply and supplies the state with 50% of its hydroelectric energy. Our beloved Tuolumne is a large part of this system, supplying water to over 200,000 acres in the Central Valley and drinking water to over 2.7 million people in the Bay Area. Unfortunately, our waterways are impacted by waste and other pollutants making their way downstream, so we’re asking for your help in cleaning up our waterways!

History of Coastal Cleanup Day

The idea for a statewide cleanup was started by Oregon resident Judy Neilson in 1984. Judy organized the “Plague of Plastics” event in October of that year due to rising concerns over the amount of plastic debris along the coast. In 1985, California emulated those efforts and created the California Coastal Cleanup Day, led by the Coastal Cleanup Commission.

In 1993, California Coastal Cleanup Day was recognized by the Guinness Book of World Records as the “largest garbage collection” ever organized, with 50,405 volunteers. Since then, the reach of Coastal Cleanup Day has spread inland, as most of the marine debris that we find on our beaches actually starts as urban trash or street litter.

For more information on California Coastal Cleanup Day, visit the Coastal Cleanup Commission’s page.